Parliament's work on the multi-agency report on the arms deal hit a snag on its first day on Tuesday when opposition parties accused the African National Congress of trying to bulldoze the document through its committees.

The Democratic Party contingent in the portfolio committee on public service and administration said the ANC had attempted to "use its muscle" to push through its views on the report.

Freedom Front defence spokesman Pieter Groenewald said the defence joint standing committee's handling of the report on the multi-billion arms deal was "a farce, and only a rubber stamp".

Three of the seven National Assembly committees - justice, defence and public service and administration - tasked with dealing with the 380-page report met on Tuesday.

The document was tabled last week by the three investigating agencies - the Auditor General, National Directorate of Public Prosecutions and Public Protector - and the committees have been given to December 6 to submit, at least, an interim report to Parliament.

The trade and industry portfolio committee's meeting, the first scheduled for Tuesday, was abandoned when MPs failed to arrive.

Its chairman Rob Davies said notification of the meeting had been sent out too late.

The other committees are the standing committee on public accounts (Scopa), and the portfolio committees on finance and ethics.

Scopa, which recommended the multi-agency probe into the deal late last year, is due to meet on Wednesday. Each committee will compile a separate report to be tabled once Parliament re-opens next year.

DP public service spokesman Mike Waters said the ANC had resorted to "bulldozing tactics" to rush that committee's work on the chapter dealing with conflicts of interest by public servants.

"Not once did the committee deal with the chapter itself but rather spent its time dealing with procedural issues."

ANC members had said the report was "so clear that there is no need to call for a further session with any or all of the agencies".

Waters suggested the committee extend the scope of its work and be given adequate opportunity to process its report.

"Spending less than three hours on the report is certainly not good enough," he said.

But justice portfolio committee members agreed that it was not their task to investigate further.

Committee chairman Johnny de Lange (ANC) told MPs: "The last thing I am going to do is another investigation. That's not our job."

On the report and its findings, he said: "I don't expect you to do anything but note it. Parliament must make sure the recommendations are dealt with."

His view was shared by all parties present at the meeting, including the DP.

De Lange suggested one of the recommendations the committee could make was that changes to the Corruption Act of 1992 should be tabled in Parliament as soon as possible.

The act had repealed several common law offences, including bribery, he said.

All seven committee chairs met later on Tuesday and agreed to provide the National Assembly's chairman of committees Johannes Mahlangu with a schedule of their planned meetings.

He would use these to co-ordinate proceedings and in particular the various committee's interaction with the investigators.

Scopa chairman Dr Gavin Woods said his committee needed two to three weeks to study the report and the likelihood was that hearings would only be held with the agencies on December 5 and 6.

However, De Lange said this should be brought forward.

"If we only start on the 5th and 6th of December the deadlines are made to be broken... (the agencies) should be called quickly before the committee so that we can get on with our work," he said.